Facilities Management

What Regulations Govern Data Center Operations? In the United States, various codes and regulations protect the environment and keep workers safe. There are several types of environmental compliance requirements that pertain specifically to data center operations, each requirement varying based on the size and type of data center involved. But unfortunately, data center managers can become so focused on what it takes to ensure uptime that these environmental and health and safety compliance requirements can get overlooked. There are fines for noncompliance that can amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars and, in certain circumstances, a manager can be held personally liable for a violation. Environmental regulations common to data center operations One environmental regulation applies to diesel fuel storage. If you store diesel fuel for your emergency generators in excess of 1,320 gallons, you are required to perform an evaluation to determine if your data center falls under Spill Prevention, Control and Countermeasure (SPCC) plans. The plan includes spill prevention and cleanup procedures, inspection protocols, recordkeeping, and training and may require that a professional engineer, or PE, sign off on the plan....

If you’re like me, you’ve had to deal with a few batteries in your career. It’s usually one of the weak links in mission-critical environments; and consequently, we find ourselves obsessing over battery condition, life expectancy, and failure rates quite often. We can literally spend millions of dollars each year due to failed cells or end-of-life replacements. Wouldn’t it be nice not to have to deal with that – or even to worry about it? I have recently (with some excitement, I might add) been investigating vanadium redox flow batteries. These systems use fluids — or more precisely, electrolytes — to store energy. I’m not going to get technical in this post; but if you want to know more today, here’s a Wikipedia link. How the battery works Basically, there are two tanks of electrolyte with a membrane in a frame between the two. The two electrolytes set up a potential across the membrane that allows for the flow of electrons....

When I was a facilities manager (FM), I had to make decisions around whether to repair or replace a facility asset (chiller, reverse osmosis unit, UPS, etc.). Some of these decisions I was authorized to make alone, but others had to go up the chain of command for higher-level approvals. Regardless of who ultimately made the decision, I had to be able to justify the repair or the replacement. The decision to repair or replace Like many FMs, a part of me just wanted new equipment because I had the perception that newer equipment would give me fewer headaches. Another part of me was driven by the need to reach the goal of having no failures and the perception that newer equipment would have less chance of failure. (Besides, new equipment is just cool.) In reality, as the facilities manager, I was working for companies that needed to make a profit or were held to some financial requirement and it drove me to build a decision framework that aligned with their financial goals. While I hoped company leaders would understand the language of engineering — and some did — it was more often the case that they understood the world in terms of finance, which required me to put the justification in financial terms....

What does it mean to your client when you place a static switch or UPS in bypass? Most clients won’t understand that it means their business is now at the mercy of the utility supplying power. Most clients won’t associate risk with the statement at all — let alone imagine their company on the front page of the Wall Street Journal because of an outage. When you communicate with your client about maintenance or your process, is there any way to know what they really understand? Many years ago when we were running one of our first data centers, we tried to come up with a way to relate what we did in facilities to our clients. Shawn Patrick came up with an idea that we started calling “Level of Readiness.” We rated the risk to our customers based on our equipment and process conditions. Ever since, I have used a very similar idea to communicate to the clients of data centers the level of risk our operations pose to their processes, systems, and business....

In my last blog (Hiring a Facilities Manager), I mentioned that it is important for a candidate’s values to align with an organization’s values if the candidate is to be successful in their new position. In fact, this attribute, more than any other, dictates whether they can be successful in an organization or not. What makes alignment of values more important in the hiring process than knowledge, skill, and experience? Values form the basis of everyday decisions Every day, managers and leaders make decisions. It is one of the critical aspects of the position of manager or leader. During the hiring process, we specifically look for the ability to analyze whatever is necessary to support good decisions, but what is the basis upon which those decisions will ultimately be made? The values of the individual making the decision will dictate the outcome of the decision. You see, we make decisions based upon our values and beliefs, and we do analysis to determine what decisions will align with those values. In a sense, the decisions we make must support our personal values and beliefs, or the conflict that arises will eventually create insurmountable tension. What can result is a situation where a good decision for the organization may conflict with the manager’s values and beliefs....

Tradition may dictate that the best technician or the most senior person in your organization be promoted into supervisory or managerial positions, but this practice may not always be the best choice in reality. Yes, the best technician or most senior person most likely demonstrates some of the technical knowledge and skill that would be required of anyone filling the role of facilities manager. But the fact is that if you don’t look for these other important traits when you make the hire, your facilities manager will likely fail – or at least fail to be as successful as they need to be. In The Crucial Role Of The Facilities Manager In Mission Critical Environments, I discussed what to look for when hiring a facilities manager (or any member of the facilities management team, for that matter) but how do you know which candidates actually embrace these qualities? To answer this question, we must take an honest look at some of the most important traits for success in the position:...